Chapter 1 Introduction to Personality Theory 17example, a personality inventory that attempts to measure extraversion should
correlate with other measures of extraversion or other factors such as sociability
and assertiveness that are known to cluster together with extraversion. An inven-
tory has divergent construct validity if it has low or insignificant correlations with
other inventories that do not measure that construct. For example, an inventory
purporting to measure extraversion should not be highly correlated with social
desirability, emotional stability, honesty, or self-esteem. Finally, an inventory has
discriminant validity if it discriminates between two groups of people known to
be different. For example, a personality inventory measuring extraversion should
yield higher scores for people known to be extraverted than for people known to
be introverted.
A second dimension of validity is predictive validity, or the extent that a test
predicts some future behavior. For example, a test of extraversion has predictive
validity if it correlates with future behaviors, such as smoking cigarettes, perform-
ing well on scholastic achievement tests, taking risks, or any other independent
criterion. The ultimate value of any measuring instrument is the degree to which
it can predict some future behavior or condition.
Most of the early personality theorists did not use standardized assess-
ment inventories. Although Freud, Adler, and Jung all developed some form
of projective tool, none of them used the technique with sufficient precision to
establish its reliability and validity. However, the theories of Freud, Adler, and
Jung have spawned a number of standardized personality inventories as
researchers and clinicians have sought to measure units of personality proposed
by those theorists. Later personality theorists, especially Julian Rotter, Hans
Eysenck, and the Five-Factor Theorists have developed and used a number of
personality measures and have relied heavily on them in constructing their
theoretical models.
Key Terms and Concepts
∙ (^) The term “personality” comes from the Latin persona, or the mask that
people present to the outside world, but psychologists see personality as
much more than outward appearances.
∙ (^) Personality includes all those relatively permanent traits or characteristics
that render some consistency to a person’s behavior.
∙ (^) A theory is a set of related assumptions that allows scientists to
formulate testable hypotheses.
∙ (^) Theory should not be confused with philosophy, speculation, hypothesis,
or taxonomy, although it is related to each of these terms.
∙ Personality theories cover at least five distinct perspectives: psychodynamic,
humanistic-positive, dispositional, biological-evolutionary, and learning/
social-cognitive